Heather Witt and her group of volunteers distribute scarfs, gloves and hats by stringing them in bags to trees in Milwaukee County Parks for whoever needs them.
Michael Sears/Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

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The contents of the bags include a hat, gloves and scarf.(Photo: Michael Sears/Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)Buy Photo

On a recent Sunday morning, a couple of hundred plastic bags, each containing a scarf, a knit cap, and a pair of mittens or gloves, appeared seemingly out of nowhere in areas of Milwaukee frequented by the down and out.

The bags were tied with colored yarn to trees, posts and fences. Each contained a note:

"I'm Not Lost. If You're Stuck In The Cold Please Take Me To Keep You Warm!"

It was a guerrilla act of kindness, and its perpetrators were led by Heather Witt, who, on the bags she placed, also wrote: "You are loved," and whose opinion of humanity is positive to the point of being mildly disruptive:

"I think we all have something in us that wants to do good," she says.

Think about that for a minute.

Set your cynicism aside for just a moment, however justified it might be. And consider: What if that was true?

What if that was true about you?

Around three years ago, Heather was poking around Facebook and came across a post from a group of people who, at the onset of winter, went around their city and tied scarves to trees, inviting anyone in need to take one.

Heather thought this was brilliant.

She mentioned it to a co-worker, Michelle Meyer, and in short-order, they created their own Facebook page, Operation Scarf, and began collecting, bagging and distributing warm items in random ways.

This year was their third offensive.

A handful of people met at Red Arrow Park with eight white garbage bags, each containing about 25 hat/scarf/gloves packages.

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Heather Witt (center) goes over the plan to distribute bags of mittens and scarves with other volunteers at Red Arrow Park. The group has been collecting hats, scarves and mittens, packing them in plastic bags, and tied the bags to trees with notes on them for whoever needed them to stay warm to take them. The project is called Operation Scarf.
Michael Sears/Milwaukee Journal Sentinel